littlelady
God bless the USA
https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/president-george-hw-bush-dead-94/story?id=44866630
Thank you for your service.
Thank you for your service.
RIP, GHW Bush...
- Thread starter littlelady
- Start date
22AcaciaAve
Well-Known Member
RIP. I always felt he was the best president of my era. He built a coalition during the gulf war that was unprecedented. One of the biggest testaments to his class and dignity was that he and Bill Clinton ended up becoming friends for good causes. He was a class act all the way. Pretty much the last great leader of America that I can remember.
littlelady
God bless the USA
Agree.
Hijinx
Well-Known Member
He was a good President and a WW2 hero, He made some mistakes like we all do.
His biggest mistake was becoming a friend to Bill Clinton.
But I wish him to Rest in peace.
Grumpy
Well-Known Member
That was never more obvious than when McCain kicked the bucket.
SamSpade
Well-Known Member
There's probably no way to win in these instances where a political adversary dies.
If you're a jerk and insult them, you'll be branded as someone who speaks ill of the dead.
If you're gracious - but you weren't when they were alive - you're still a jerk (but you'll possibly get away with it).
If you say NOTHING - which is probably the right thing to do - SOME outlet will give you crap for being quiet.
I don't feel compelled to #trudeaueulogy and say nice things about a #### head just because they died. I know they're all trotting out the superlatives now and making Bush out to be the Second Coming just like they did with McCain, but he was a fairly lackluster President with no real accomplishment. He was a placeholder - an aloof elitist who didn't seem to give a crap about the People, and was only vaguely aware they even existed.
Economy - meh.
Education - meh.
Desert Storm - meh. More on that in a minute...
Panama - meh.
He put Clarence Thomas on the bench, so that's something good. But he cancelled it out by also giving us Souter.
The one single thing that makes Bush a contender for "Worst President EVER" was that his lack of interest gave us President William Jefferson Clinton and his harridan wife, both of whom haunt us to this day. Clinton went into that election with so many negatives, my damn cat should have been able to beat him. But Bush took a pass and here we are. You can blame Perot if you want to, but after he bailed Bush shouldn't have allowed him to come back the way he did. A more engaged President would have had a solid enough base to win re-election, but I don't recall Bush even campaigning in any meaningful way.
Another thing that made Bush a terrible President was his handling of Iraq's invasion of Kuwait. At the time the liberal press called him "diplomatic", but my description was "weak" and "UN ass kisser" and "didn't finish the job". HW was very interested in being chummy with America's enemies, and not so much with the people who put his ass in office.
On a scale of 1 to 10, he gets a 3.
Economy - meh.
Education - meh.
Desert Storm - meh. More on that in a minute...
Panama - meh.
He put Clarence Thomas on the bench, so that's something good. But he cancelled it out by also giving us Souter.
The one single thing that makes Bush a contender for "Worst President EVER" was that his lack of interest gave us President William Jefferson Clinton and his harridan wife, both of whom haunt us to this day. Clinton went into that election with so many negatives, my damn cat should have been able to beat him. But Bush took a pass and here we are. You can blame Perot if you want to, but after he bailed Bush shouldn't have allowed him to come back the way he did. A more engaged President would have had a solid enough base to win re-election, but I don't recall Bush even campaigning in any meaningful way.
Another thing that made Bush a terrible President was his handling of Iraq's invasion of Kuwait. At the time the liberal press called him "diplomatic", but my description was "weak" and "UN ass kisser" and "didn't finish the job". HW was very interested in being chummy with America's enemies, and not so much with the people who put his ass in office.
On a scale of 1 to 10, he gets a 3.
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For me... His service to the country earns him respect but your portrayal of his presidency is spot on.
He gained the office through an underlying expectation of it being "Reagan Tour 3" and it turned out nothing like that.
Bradley Manning served his country.
David Berkowitz served his country.
Timothy McVeigh served his country.
The Beltway Sniper; BTK; lots of ####bags served their country.
I don't give anyone a pass just because they served their country.
This is why I'm a big fan of the President having been either a governor or a businessperson. They know how to run things. B41 was a congressman then an ambassador before becoming a dept head. While he headed the CIA, he didn't come up through the ranks. I'm sure he knew very little about the nuts & bolts of the spy game.
He was an avid angler, so I can relate to that. On our New England tour, we drove past his family compound. It wasn't some obscene monstrosity on the water. Instead it was a decent place out on the point where they could watch the sunrise from the deck. I could see their family mingling with the summer crowd at Kennebunkport with not too much fanfare.
In the navy, 1 of my shipmates who was most likely a pothead in high school, had a president Bush tagline. He always let it be known that "Hemp saved George Bush's life. I hope he's blazing 1 in Bush's honor right now.
Hey, you left out Jeff Dahmer.
Hijinx
Well-Known Member
Truth be told Colon Powell talked him out of finishing off Iraq.
transporter
Well-Known Member
WingsOfGold
Well-Known Member
Good man and good president. Served his country flying TBF's. Sadly Perot gave us Clinton over a second term. The wrong man died.
mitzi
Well-Known Member
The debates where he looked totally disinterested and kept looking at his watch.
I think he deserves more than 3. I can't say he was worse than a 5, as I feel like many of the qualities and experience that he brought to the Office of the Presidency were, at the time, ones our country needed. I would have to give him at least a 6. I think it's easier in hindsight to say this should have been or that should have been. I don't disagree with the handling of Iraq's invasion of Kuwait didn't go far enough. George HW Bush was a very different man than our current POTUS and I like/liked both. I dont think the whole presidency was a waste - a lot of good things happened while he was in office. The Berlin Wall coming down, the sigining of the ADA. I don't think everything he did was on point, nor did I vote for him a 2nd time because of it. I disagree that he was an elitist - in watching (before today even, but also today) some of the retrospectives - everyone interviewed said without exception what a nice man he was, and how he & Barbara always treated everyone nicely, no matter their lot in life. In fact, one of the people who was recounting a past story told of the time Ellen DeGeneres praised him and considered the family "friends" because of all the money he helped to raise after Hurricane Katrina hit.
Thing2 and I are going to venture up into DC on Tuesday to the Capitol to pay our patriotic respects. I've never done that and I anticipate that this might be my last chance for a number of years. I wouldn't go for Carter or Clinton. I don't expect GW will pass anytime soon, and I'll probaby be living somewhere else by then anyway. So, I have the time I can take, and Thing2 is off that day, so we're gonna go.
SamSpade
Well-Known Member
"Didn't finish the job" - beginning to think you're channeling Larry. Because we've all had this discussion before.
In order to gain Arab support - to be able to use their land as a staging area - to use their support troops - and a number of other things -
leaving Saddam in power was one of those objectives. Without that - we're not in Riyadh, we're not in Qatar, we don't have
100,000 Saudi troops fighting with us - or Egypt, or Pakistan - on and on. It was a condition of the coalition, and in retrospect -
a reasonable one, since without an Iraq as a counter-balance - Iran can roll over everyone.
It was laid out fairly clearly before we even launched the air campaign - we were to liberate Kuwait and erase Iraq's
ability to make war in the region. That, we did. I don't know what would have been accomplished had we kept
going to Baghdad.
littlelady
God bless the USA
That is the thing, Sam. The USA is the most powerful and benevolent country in the World, but we can’t fix everything. I wish WE could. The ‘spin’ of it all is what is so disruptive.
Edit: All the more reason to build “the wall”. Why are so many gov employees and voters so clueless to what is happening? I know the answer. It doesn’t matter because elitist gov, celebs, lobotomized people, in general, don’t realize what they are wishing for. Good thing so many patriots in our country own guns, and will not give them up, willingly.
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